PLEDGES FROM SENATE LEADERS

The House Medicare bill - - but not the Senate bill - - allows the new prescription drug benefit to be offered by these plans with unmanaged access to drugs, and allows senior citizens to add their own money on top of the government contribution to get such unrationed drug insurance. The Senate bill as passed denies older Americans this right, allowing them to get the prescription drug benefit only in a managed care form. Pro-life Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, M.D. (R-Tn.) and pro-life Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-Ia.) entered the following pledge into the Congressional Record:

Mr. Frist: Mr. President, I believe in assuring the ability of seniors who choose to do so to add their own funds on top of the government contribution in order to participate in private fee-for-service plans under Medicare.

I also believe that private fee-for-service plans should be able to provide an unmanaged form of the subsidized prescription drug benefit. Accordingly,

I am committed to ensuring that the bill reported from the conference committee that will consider S.1 and H.R. 1 incorporates the functional equivalent of those provisions in H.R. 1 that permit private fee-for-service plans to provide the subsidized prescription drug benefit as an unmanaged benefit whose premium amount, just like the premium amount such plans charge for the core Medicare benefit under current law, is not subject to governmental review or approval.

Mr. Grassley: I agree.